The present invention relates to a brake carrier, in particular, a carrier for a heavy vehicle disc brake.
Heavy vehicles, such as rigid body trucks, tractor and semi-trailer trucks, and buses may be braked on their steered and unsteered axles, driven and undriven axles by either drum brakes or disc brakes. Drum brake linings and their associated actuation mechanisms are supported on fixed axles or the steering knuckles of steered axles by a bracket welded directly to the axle, which has all the required mounting parts, or via an intermediate bracket welded to the axle with a number of mounting holes for the bolts of a separate support for the linings and actuation mechanism.
In the latter case, it is known to provide an adapter plate that is bolted to this intermediate bracket in order that a brake carrier of a sliding caliper disc brake may be mounted to an axle otherwise intended to mount drum brakes. This is particularly useful when a vehicle originally fitted with drum brakes is to be updated to have disc brakes as it enables the original axles to be retained without complex modifications.
Disadvantageously, this arrangement adds to the overall weight of the axle and brake without a corresponding increase in strength, and results in additional fixing bolts being used in locations where they are not readily accessible when the axle is installed on a vehicle.
Furthermore, it has become apparent in recent years that as clamp forces, and hence frictional forces, in heavy vehicle brakes rise, it is increasingly difficult to produce a brake carrier that is sufficiently strong, light and compact to transmit this load to the vehicle axle, particularly on the actuating side thereof.
The present invention seeks to overcome, or at least mitigate the problems of the prior art.